E-Collar Training

LOL, i have saw a few that had a vibrate feature and a tone feature but that to me is just more unneccessary bells and whistles. The guy is incredible though, I just wish he would have shared some of his knowledge with me, he was very guarded on hiis techniques.

I know that this is an old thread but thought I would chime in since e-collars are gettong more and more popular with different kinds of trainers. It can be a great training tool and have I used it to train gundogs and it works wonders, but, if you dont know how to use it properly you can do alot of damage to the dog and set back training. I would recommend not using one unless you are familiar in the proper usage. A dog can also get "collar wise" which is basically them knowing when it is on and when it is off, and they wont listen when it is off.

I'm no expert on e-collar but I do own one (tri-tronics classic 70) and have a few videos on the subject. I believe the use of the collar has to be approached with careful consideration. I personally don't like the e-collar. I have a natural aversion to giving a dog a stim and haven't yet defined why I feel this way. One obvious reason is that I don't like relying on a gadget that must be on the dog for the dog to respond to me. I realize that a dog can be weaned off the collar by careful juggling between the actual collar, dummy collar and other collars but some dogs still see through it. I would rather use other methods whenever possible but recognize that in some situations the e-collar is indispensible.

The use of the collar can be divided into two approaches. The first being simply a correction. It is a no brainer, the dog does something you don't want it to do and it gets a stim. The only use I've given my collar for a long time is when a new dog that I would put in the kennel would start jumping and scratching at the house windows which face the kennel. In this situation I didn't want to start my relationship with the dog on the wrong foot by having the correction come from me. But the behavior was unacceptable so I would use the collar. Care must be given to use the minimum level stim that will achieve the desired effect. The situation I described is a very clear cut situation that is easy for the dog make a conclusion about.

The other approach with the e-collar is to teach the dog to actually do things. The underlying priciple can be called escape training and is very effective. But it's a training system that needs to be learned and is more than what I can explain in a single post. This is where you really can mess the dog up if you don't do the foundation properly.

Very good advise on the e collar and your attitude towards it. Thank you Dan